Half boiled Ramen Eggs (糖心滷蛋)

Ramen Eggs

I have a friend who loves half boiled ramen eggs. She frequents her favourite ramen shop for these. These days, it is rare to find ramen shops that still serve half boiled ramen eggs due to health regulations. Most of the time, you get hard boiled eggs with your bowl of ramen. 

Half-boiled Eggs

That chewy white with the soft wet yolk that almost melts with your ramen soup. Hmmm... perfect combination. As part of my ramen "making" series, I made these eggs earlier to pair with my instant noodles. Bits and pieces... I hope I would eventually get to making the actual ramen. ;p

In any case, these eggs are good enough to hold one captive on its own! Simply good on its own. I love eggs... :)

糖心滷蛋

Recipe

3 Large Eggs (Room temperature)

3 Cups Water

1 Tsp Salt

1/4 Cup Soy sauce

1 Cup Water

3 Tbsp Mirin

3 Tbsp Sugar

1. Bring 3 cups water and salt to a boil.

2. Use a spoon or ladle, gently transfer eggs into the water. Make sure eggs are sitting in a single layer.

3. Cook eggs for 6 ~ 8 minutes on middle heat. Cook time varies with the heat and pot use.

4. Immediately soak eggs in cold water to prevent further cooking.

5. Mix soy sauce, 1 cup water, mirin and sugar. Whisk until sugar is incorporated. Set aside.

6. Soak a piece of paper coffee filter or cheesecloth in the soy sauce mixture.

6. Gently peel the eggs. Place eggs in a bowl in which they fit snugly in a single layer.

7. Pour soy sauce mixture over the eggs.

8. Place the soaked coffee filter or cheesecloth over the eggs. 

9. Soak eggs for at least two hours at room temperature or overnight in refrigerator.

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Tips & Tricks

1. The cooking time varies with the number of eggs, temperature of your raw eggs, your saucepan and stove heat. Experiment with the cooking time - starting at the 6 minutes and giving 30 seconds forward. Time starts when all eggs are added. When I use a larger pot and it took me 8 minutes to get the eggs to half boiled stage vs. for a smaller pot, it took me 6 minutes.

2. You can use an egg timer to help with the cooking. If you use the egg timer, transfer eggs to cold water once the indicator reached the 3/4 mark between soft and medium. The internal heat of the eggs will continue to cook the eggs as they cool in the cold water.

3. For softer whites, do not soak the eggs in soy sauce for more than 2 hours. The longer the eggs are soaked, the firmer the whites.

4. Be gentle while peeling the eggs. They are very fragile as the insides are still watery and soft.

5. If eggs are undercooked after peeling, you can return them to a pot of boiling water and cook further for about 3 minutes.

6. Use room temperature eggs. Eggs fresh out of fridge will crack once they hit the boiling water due to the sudden change in temperature.

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My Japanese Kitchen

For a picture of Mirin, please refer to my Chasu recipe.

Japanese Chasu

Japanese Chasu

Japanese Chasu is quite different from the Chinese Chasiu. Japanese Chasu is mainly roast pork in soy sauce while Chinese Chasiu is a barbecue pork with soy sauce and hoisin sauce. Japanese Chasu often uses the pork belly meat while Chinese Chasu mainly used the pork loin meat.

I love the round Japanese Chasu that you often find in a bowl of delicious ramen. After all, what's not to love about this juicy dish - with layers of fats and tender meat melting in your mouth at every bite. Yummy-licious is the word for it.

Japanese Chasu rice

One of our favorite Chasu from Santouka. We never failed to order an extra bowl of Chasu rice when we visit Santouka. The Santouka's Chasu uses mainly pork cheeks meat which is one of the fattiest meat of the pig but the most tender. You can get pork cheeks meat at many Chinese supermarket. It is sometimes also called pork neck meat. However, it's difficult to achieve the round Chasu shape with pork neck meat, so I chose to use pork belly meat for my Chasu recipe.

After searching through various blogs, I combined and tweaked the recipes from Just One Cookbook and No Recipe to come up with my easy to make Chasu recipe.

Japanese Chasu with rice

Japanese Chasu

Recipe

2 piece of pork belly meat (2 pounds each - request your butcher to remove the skin)
2 tablespoon of Konbu Cha or salt 
3 cup water
4 tablespoon sugar
4 tablespoon miso
6 tablespoon soy sauce
8 tablespoon mirin
8 tablespoon sake
30 grams ginger (slice into 4 ~ 5 pieces)
8 cloves garlic (smashed)
1/2 tablespoon of white pepper corns
1 stalk of green onion (cut into 4 inches)

1. Rub the pork belly with Konbu Cha or salt.

2. Roll the pork belly into a round shape. Using the pork belly skin, wrap around the meat and secure with string. If you don't need the round shape, cut the pork belly into 4 quarters.

3. Put all ingredients into a pot. The sauce or water should cover 3/4 of the pork.

4. Cover the pork with an Otoshibuta. Make sure that all corners of the pot is covered and steam is only coming out of the holes of the Otoshibuta.

5. Cooking over medium high heat for approximately 10 minutes. Once it starts to simmer, lower the heat to medium low and cook the meat for approximately 2.5 hours.

6. Check the meat occasionally after 2 hours. Turn off heat when there is only 1 inch of the liquid left. The liquid should have thicken and is shiny.

7. Wait for meat to cool completely before slicing.

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Ramen at Mitsuwa (Santouka)

Salt flavor ramen from Santouka

I need a ramen fix! I've been bugging my husband for ramen since last weekend. Finally, he gave in and we drove down to Mitsuwa on Sunday to get my favourite ramen from Santouka.

Santouka shop at Saratoga, CA

For a little ramen shop located at the foodcourt of Mitsuwa, Santouka has its share of loyal followers. Come lunch time, the queue can sometimes extend to the the entrance of Mitsuwa. However, the wait is relatively quick. You basically queue for the order and wait approximate 30 minutes for your ramen to be ready. For us, the wait time often flew by quickly... the foodie in us will always make use of the waiting time to get some sushi and drinks from Mitsuwa. =)

Plate of Cha-siu from Santouka

Santouka is a ramen chain store founded in Japan with locations in many parts of the world. I love the salt flavour ramen - there's something about those chewy noodles and yummy soup that makes me asking for a bigger stomach to eat more. BUT, the best thing from Santouka is the cha-siu! That cha-siu is so good. Those slices of pork has the right amount of fats and meat, with the fats melting away the instant it hits your mouth. Drawing out the flavour of the cha-siu, together with the tender meat and melt-away fats- you get a mouthful of yummy-licous as you chew away at the cha-siu.

 

Cha-siu rice from Santouka

  
Another favourite of ours at Santouka is the cha-siu rice. Well, with cha-siu that good... you can't go wrong with this order. I find that matching the cha-siu with rice allows you to get a better taste from the cha-siu sauce which takes the cha-siu taste to a whole different level. Not to get me wrong, eating the cha-siu together with the noodles is great, but I find that some of the cha-siu sauce flavor is often lost within the ramen soup. To get a true taste of the sauce, it's best to eat it with some rice.

After satisfying my ramen craving, I decide to start a "ramen" making series. So watch out for my blog as I tried to make those yummy-licous cha-siu, ramen and eggs in the next few weeks...